


Interlude--Claire

by JadeyKins



Series: Devil's Backbone [4]
Category: Constantine (TV), Supernatural
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-01
Updated: 2015-02-01
Packaged: 2018-03-09 22:54:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3267419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JadeyKins/pseuds/JadeyKins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John spots a girl in a bar who's about to be in over her head. After coming to her aid, he discovers who she is. Coincidence or planned event?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Interlude--Claire

John leaned in on the bar, his hand hovering over the glass, and cracked a small nostalgic smile. He watched the little show going on at the pool table, even as he finished off the last of the gin in his glass. 

Chas, who hadn’t even so much as glanced down the bar much less shown any interest in the pool table, said, “She’s a little young for you.”

“Not why I’m staring at her.”

“Didn’t think so.” Chas polished off his beer and ordered another round with gestures. “What’s the interest?”

“I don’t know. She seems familiar somehow.” John spun the empty glass around slow.

So far, blondie at the pool table hadn’t noticed John’s attention. Hadn’t noticed much going on past the table, really. She bent over the table too much, trying to distract one of the men she played against, but she was pulling attention from two lecherous assholes that didn’t seem to mind that a minor had worked her way into a rather nasty bar. Well, all she’d had to do was walk through the door, but no one who worked the place had tossed her and they should have. She couldn’t be more than sixteen or seventeen. Definitely far below the legal drinking age. Not to mention, the world had yet burn off that naïve, innocent air that clung around her. 

“From where?” Chas asked.

“That’s the problem nagging me. I can’t recall.”

“Maybe stop staring at her then.”

“I would, but I suspect there’s going to be trouble.”

“And why’s that?”

“She’s been lifting their wallets.” 

The bartender set down the drinks and Chas paid the man.

One of the pool players walked away from the table.

“Looks like they’re about to figure her out,” John said.

“They don’t look the forgiving kind. You got a plan?”

The girl was biting at her lip, saying something to one of the other players, gesturing towards the restroom. The player gestured at the table. If nothing else, the girl’s demeanor was becoming obvious. Guilty, fidgety. Cagey. Oh, she wanted to fly as fast and far as she could.

“Step in. Try not to get stabbed. You hang back as our last minute rescue.” John spun around and stood up. He sidled around, mostly using the shadow, to circle back in as if he’d come from the door.

Chas, for his part, hung back and worked on that second beer. 

“There you are,” John said, pulling on tones of Captain Jack’s American accent, as he neared the table. He made eye contact with the girl. “I’ve been searching everywhere. Your dad’s worried sick. Is your phone even on?”

“Uh, yeah,” the girl said. She set the pool cue down.

The guy at the bar realized he’d been robbed. He glared over at them, shouting, “Hey!”

John shoved the nearest pool player to clear the path for the girl. 

She didn’t waste any time. She bolted for the door. 

The one near the bar had to go past Chas and Chas kindly introduced the man to the floor with a well-placed shove. The other two, they were in John’s face. He grabbed the forgotten cue and swiped wide with it. One of the two grabbed it and yanked it out of his hands.

A couple of others were far too interested in the forming fight. If they joined on the side of the local boys, John would be far outnumbered and even Chas’s help couldn’t save him. So he abandoned the pool cue and scattered for the exit as well.

Seconds later, Chas burst out after him. “That was the plan?”

“Shut it,” John said. He glanced out over the parking lot. “Alright. Where’d she go?”

“John, we’re still going to have a fight on our hands here.”

John twisted ‘round and stretched his hand out towards the doors. He muttered a verse and the locks popped loud. 

The doors rattled.

Chas glared at John.

“There’s two doors out the back and a great big bloody window right there. They’ll get out, just not this second after us. But we got maybe less than a minute before half the place turns out.”

“I’ll get the car,” Chas said.

John went the opposite way towards the dark side of the building.

And got a gun thrust in his face.

He skittered back against the gravel and held up his hands. “Whoa there, love. Don’t mean no harm.”

She shook some, but there was a fierceness to her eyes. A survivalist’s gleam. “Back off!”

“They’ll be coming out and they’ll be pissed. My friend and I can give you a lift out of here. Drop you off wherever.”

“Why do you care?”

The noises from the other side of the bar said that the crowd had in fact found a way out of the building. Chas was bringing the car up alongside him. 

“Because I’ve been a teenager filching wallets off of strangers,” John said. “Just trying to give a hand.”

“There they are!” one of the men shouted.

“Come on, yeah?” John waved at the taxi.

The girl glanced at the oncoming crowd and then back to the taxi. Impending decision weighed in her eyes. She was a smart one, pulling all those calculations, looking at all those circumstances in a blink of an eye. Not much was going to get past her, despite that innocent demeanor. No surprise, then, that she made the right call. She booked it for the backseat.

John climbed into the front. Safely tucked away, Chas sped off down the highway. 

After the edge of adrenaline wore off, John slunk down farther in the seat. He held his hand up over it towards the girl and said, “Wallet.”

“What?”

“Felt you nick it when you went past. Which was rude, by the way. I was risking a broken nose for you, maybe even cracked ribs, and you steal from me?”

She slapped the leather into his hand. John brought it down, counted its contents, and then shoved it into his pocket.

“So which one’s real?”

“How’s that?”

“Your accent. Which one’s real?”

“This one is, love.”

“Why fake the other one?”

“Give us a few seconds to clear out. Distraction.” John grinned and held up a wallet between two fingers. “And I got the one you missed.” He tossed it back at her.

“Where’s home?” Chas asked.

She hesitated, then said, “Take the next right.”

“You’re lying,” John said.

“I’m not.”

John worked his way back up in the seat and turned towards her.

She was in the corner. She’d put the gun away, but not that scared expression. Of course, a girl had plenty to fear sitting in the back of a car with two complete strangers. A little caution was the smarter way. Likely that she still had a hand on that gun.

“I lie, often,” John said.

“Too often,” Chas chorused.

John gave him a short glare before rolling his gaze back to the girl again. “People have plenty of reasons for leaving where the come from. You’re out here for a reason, I take it. You don’t seem the type to be stupid enough to run off for a laugh.”

She said nothing.

“So, if we won’t be taking you home, where do you want to go?”

“I don’t know.”

“We’re heading back to Atlanta,” Chas said. “You’re welcome to come along.”

“Is my hideout a place for all refugees now?” John said.

“Jasper’s is for anyone who needs it. Besides, you save someone and they become your responsibility.”

“Is that why you keep hanging around? You feel responsible for me?”

“Thought that was why you wouldn’t leave me alone,” Chas said.

John watched the girl from the corner of his eye. She was relaxing a smidge. “Any chance we can get a name from you?”

“Claire.”

There. The name. It rang through John’s mind like a silver bell on a cold winter night. In wonder, he looked over at her and said, “Jimmy’s daughter.”

The ease that had been building in the atmosphere snapped. Claire’s eyes went wide in shock and then fear and then narrowed in determination. She grabbed the door handle. “Stop the car!”

“What?” Chas said.

Claire was already shoving the door open.

Chas slammed on the breaks and John bounced forward towards the dash.

Claire had the advantage in that she already had the door open. She hopped out and ran for the nearby woods.

“Stay here!” John ordered. He threw open his door and chased after the girl. While she had the initial advantage, he had the longer legs. Darkness was an old friend and he pushed on through the leaves and branches without losing step.

She found a trail, rabbited down it. Determined to catch up, he put that extra bit of speed in his step as she rounded a corner. He came around the bend.

Her gun was out and up.

John skidded, fell onto his back, and the shot whizzed over his head. 

She aimed at him.

“Whoa!” John stuck his hands up in surrender. “Whoa!”

“How did you know his name?” Her hands were shaking and her eyes watering.

“Psychic accident between me and the Angel Castiel.” Lies were best not done around a shaken teenager with a loaded weapon.

“Did he send you after me?”

“No! We were winding down in the bar. Just happened to find the place you were in.”

“So you expect me to believe that some Castiel groupie just dropped in?” she said. 

“Groupie?” John glanced down at his wardrobe. “Bastard stole the look off me, love. Not the other way ‘round.”

“Sure.”

“Look, shouldn’t have dropped your dad’s name like I did, but shooting me’s not going to solve any of your problems, so let’s say you put the gun away, yeah? We can work out whatever you want, even if you go traipsing off into the scary dark woods all by yourself.”

Claire lowered the gun. 

John finally took in a deep breath again. He pushed himself up off the ground. 

“What were you doing?” she asked.

“Other than apparently risking my neck multiple times this evening?”

“You’re driving all the way to Atlanta. We’re in Missouri. Why are you all the way out here?”

“We were following a particularly nasty beast up I-24. Would’ve liked you. Ate teenagers.”

“And it’s just coincidence that we ran into each other,” Claire said. The skepticism was strong in her voice, in her face. 

“Didn’t say that, love. We didn’t intend to find you, but that doesn’t mean something’s not playing with us.”

“Did Castiel set us up?” Claire said.

That little note of hope in her voice damn near broke a bit of John’s heart. Kids, every time. He managed a weak smile for her and shook his head. “He doesn’t have the kind of power and he’s a wee bit more direct. If Heaven’s at work here, it’s most likely your guardian Angel looking out for you. Nudged us into the other’s path.”

“Isn’t Castiel my guardian?”

“Hardly seems his department,” John said. “Besides, you’d have some huge gaps in coverage if that were the case. No, someone else is looking out for you. And I’ve a sneaky suspicion on that who.”

“Only because you’re paranoid,” Manny said.

Both John and Claire whirled around. That was different, and John cracked a broader smile. She was moving; she’d heard him too. “But my hypothesis is right.”

“Watch your pride.” Manny folded his wings back out of view. “It’ll be your undoing.”

“Heard that before.”

“You’re my guardian Angel?” Claire asked.

“I am,” Manny said.

“Well, you suck at your job.”

John laughed. “I like you.”

Claire flashed the tiniest of smiles back at him.

“Yes, because I needed the two of you to get along so well,” Manny said. “Certainly won’t make trouble for me at all.”

“Hey, you introduced us,” John said.

“Yeah,” Claire agreed.

“So us tormenting you is on your own head.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. But I suggest you get moving.” And with that, Manny disappeared.

“That’s all he had to say?” Claire said.

“Castiel used to be just as cryptic. Come on.”

They headed back down the path. Already, Claire had shifted again. She was quieter, calmer, and less the scared rabbit. “You have some of his memories?”

“A few. They’ve mostly faded out.”

“He was in my head.” Claire tucked the gun away. “For like five minutes. I was twelve.”

“Musta been hard.”

“I burned a man’s eyes out.”

“You smote a demon, and it wasn’t you.”

Claire rubbed her hands back and forth. “I said yes, doesn’t that make it my fault?”

John shivered. More blood had coated his hands recently than he dared think about, not that that had prevented the nightmares from coming. One mistake after another, but loaning out his body had been perhaps the stupidest after Gaz. “Sometimes we don’t know what we’re agreeing to.”

“My dad knew.”

“Not at first. The second time, yes.” John winced. Thinking back too much into those memories brought a searing white static noise. Castiel had promised that his head should be all right, provided he didn’t poke too long at the information he’d picked up. All that Heavenly knowledge tucked into his mind and accessing it too much might kill him. Someone was laughing over that one. 

They got back out to the road and climbed into the car. 

“We good?” Chas asked.

“Get us underway and we will be,” John said.

Chas shot him a dark look, but got the car going anyway.

“Sorry I freaked out,” Claire said after a minute. “Things have been really weird lately.”

“It’s all right,” Chas said.

“You didn’t tell me your names.”

“I’m Chas, and that’s John Constantine.”

“Is it okay if I get some sleep?”

“Go ahead, love,” John said.

Miles passed in silence and soon enough, Claire had fallen asleep across the back seat.

John was nearly asleep as well when Chas said softly, “What are we going to do with her?”

“Look after her,” he replied. “I’ll give Jack a call in the morning. I wager he’s got some resources to spare. Should be able to set her up with a place or something.”

Another mile had gone. John’s eyelids were heavy and the road was hypnotic.

“Who’s Jimmy?”

“You going to keep me awake the whole way?” John mumbled. 

“It’s another eight hours and I don’t have much to think about.”

“Jimmy was her father and Castiel’s original vessel on our plane.”

“So the guy he looks like now?”

“Jimmy’s form, but not the same body.” John slunk down in his seat and closed his eyes. “Have enough to mull over yet?”

“Suppose so, since we just became foster parents to a teenager.”

“We? Think I’m getting charged with the gig.”

Chas snorted. “You’d kill a goldfish in under a week.”

“Teenager has two advantages over a goldfish. Capable of finding food for itself and capable of a memory longer than a few seconds.”

“You know that’s a myth, right? Goldfish remember a little more than that. There was a study.”

“Sod off, Chas. We’re not going to discuss bleeding goldfish the whole way back to Georgia.”

“I gotta stay up somehow. It’s you or the radio.”

John squinted at the dash. “Coast to Coast should be on.”

“She’s sleeping.”

“So?”

“So no one likes to wake up to you shouting at the radio.”

“I’ll behave myself.”

“Fine. But you’re not using my phone to call in.”

“Couldn’t anyway, it’s blocked.” John leaned over and flicked through the stations. 

The program turned out to be about an exorcist.

John sat up and dragged out a fresh pack of cigarettes. He smirked over at Chas as he tapped the pack against his hand. “This’ll be good.”


End file.
